34. Take the money from "Defense" (why don't we just call it "War"?)

and spend it on Nice Things for the American public. Massive infrastructure, massive CLEAN energy projects, research on how to cope with global warming, etc. Make a jobs program that actually provides BENEFITS for the people (us) who fund it, instead of for the MIC and the corporations who feed off it.

22. Why not?

Renewables would allow us to increase our energy and national security thereby freeing us from the need to be involved in the Mid East to insure a supply of oil. Even placing the benefit to the environment aside (which we shouldn't as a decrease in the use of carbon based fuels will have far reaching benefits for our environment and our health).

26. Europe can put on their big boy pants

40. If they are "OUR" interests then proceeds should be nationalized.

It should be OUR oil and minerals. Not Samsung's, not BP's, not OPEC's, not Germany's, not China's. OUR'S aka the national assets of the people of the United States of America. Not even "American based" companies, the people of the United States who foot the bills and lose the blood.

Want Pax Americana, you'd best pay your protection fees and be ready to return favors when called in down to room and board when our citizens grace your shores.

See there is this issue of damn near 7 billion free riders, not even our countrymen but our economic competitors who don't have worry and great concentration of the benefit for those growing wealthy and/or powerful off the exchange.

Who is this "us"? I don't care for my "deal" very much. I am unclear on my advantages and benefits over my first world counterpart elsewhere from this arrangement. Pass.

24. The unemployment rate would be 0.03%

19. We can't cut defense spending

too many depend on the unreality of it all. What we should do is send all the nay-sayers for training at the Pentagon. When they come out they'll say "$756.63 for a Big Mac and Fries? What a bargain! I'll take 2!"

21. We should increase it until we spend at least 51% of the entire world's military spending. That way

25. begin by cutting it 10 percent

and take many of the contractors we currently employ to rebuild infrastructure in Afghanistan and Iraq (my sister works for such a firm) and reassign them to work here in the US rebuilding our own infrastructure.

Then we can have further cuts phased in over ten years bringing our military spending down by much more.

27. I'm not going to state a specific %. Instead...

I'll say that we have to completely reform the military in terms of organization, spending, and weapons procurement. We need to ask questions like:

a) if the Navy has planes, and the Air Force has planes, and the Marines have planes, can we consolidate facilities for pilot training? jet mechanic training? air traffic controller training?

b) are we buying weapons that make sense, or weapons that are making a bunch of contractors wealthy?

c) do our current roster of military bases -- both here and abroad -- make sense in the 21st century?

d) should out NATO allies be contributing more of their budgets and manpower for the defense of Western and Southern Europe?

e) should we consider getting rid of the current Army/Navy/Air Force structure, and have one unified military with one unified command structure?

f) shouldn't we ensure that we've figured out how to pay for a war (including its long-term costs involved with supporting veterans) before we send troops into harm's way?

g) how can we stop making defense contract awards an earmarking contest? it seems that the current system favors comples, expensive weapons systems that have many components that can be build in as many congressional districts as possible.

h) many of the nations on that pie graph (Russia, China) use conscripted troops for private soldiers. Should we consider returning to a draft -- especially if that draft had far fewer wealthy-friendly deferrments than the Vietnam era draft?

i) how can we become independent of imports of necessary resources so we don't have to wage war to protect those resources in foreign lands?

j) are we investing in the right kinds of intelligence resources to prevent war and provide early warning of attack?

k) if we can't afford to provide a safety-net to our citizens (the safety-net that is often dismissed as "hand-outs, welfare, or entitlements), how can we afford to continue in our role as world policeman?Perhaps that role should be re-examined.

29. Cut almost all of it

30. We should spend whatever it takes to achieve legit and justifiable goals.

First and foremost, of course, would be an overwhelming ability to defend our nation.

That includes not just maintaining enough hardware and troops to defend ourselves against enemy attack, but enough to go to r and d to stay on the cutting edge of new technologies so that we can continue to maintain that defense ability.

Ability to defend our legitimate and justifiable interests around the world, and help our allies militarily if need be, must also be assured.

32. Do we really need 75,000 troops in Europe?

or even more than that in Asia?

How about we take half of those numbers and return them to bases here in the US. We reduce our expense of posting troops overseas, and the money these troops spend goes into local economies instead of overseas economies.